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LAUNCH

The editors and contributors to Redefining social justice gathered at the University of Huddersfield last week to launch their brand new book.

The launch was part of a seminar series organised by the Centre for Research in the Social Sciences at the University of Huddersfield. The audience was drawn from staff and postgraduate students, and they joined in a very lively round-table discussion.

The event enabled us to engage in inter-disciplinary conversation and up-date our findings – so after I had outlined the book’s key findings and themes, we discussed in particular changes in Labour’s electoral strategy (Tim Heppell), its policies on disability (Chris Gifford), and changes in NHS (Ruth Deery) and legal aid (Pete Sanderson) since the election. I found particularly interesting (as it was unfamiliar to me) the ongoing research by Lesley Jeffries into political language – she is involved in an ongoing research project documenting how this is changing – and has found that ‘choice’ was a word that increasingly appeared in political manifestos during the 1990s and early 2000s – but had practically disappeared by 2010.

Conversation continued informally over lunch.

More information about Redefining social justice can be found on our website.

From left to right: Chris Gifford, Lesley Jeffries, Peter Sanderson, me, Tim Heppell and Ruth Deery. Unfortunately Pamela Fisher was unable to attend due to illness.